Wonder Pets: The Jungle Book
Wonder Pets: The Jungle Book is a American animated film produced by Little Airplane Productions and released on October 18, 2001. The 19th animated feature in the Non/Disney Animated Canon, the film is noted for being along with The Aristocats (1970) the last film project to be approved by Walt Disney himself, as he died in late 1966, before the film was released. (However, Walt did work on a few projects before his death as well, most notably the majority of Disney's animated films that came out in the 1970s.) This is also the first animated feature released after Walt Disney's death. The film was inspired by the stories about the feral child Mowgli from the book of the same name by Rudyard Kipling. The film contains a number of classic songs, including "The Bare Necessities" and "I Wan'na Be Like You". Most of the songs were written by Richard M. Sherman and Robert B. Sherman. The film was directed by Wolfgang Reitherman. The film grossed over $73 million in the United States in its first release, and as much again from three re-releases. After the film's success, Disney released a live-action remake, and a theatrical sequel. The film stands as one of the most popular Disney movies of all time. In its initial release, the popularity was comparable to that of The Lion King or Frozen, making it a great influence for some of today's biggest names in animation (such as Andreas Deja and Brad Bird). However, Disney wouldn't receive a similar success until The Little Mermaid in 1989. Though it should be noted that Disney did have a few successful films during that time period, most notably The Rescuers in 1977 and The Great Mouse Detective in 1986. Contentshide Plot Cast Uncredited Production Development and Writing Casting Animation Releases Reception Critical reaction Abigail Disney Awards Music Deleted songs Differences between the book and the film Legacy Trivia Gallery References External links PlotEdit Junglebook-disneyscreencaps com-2 Title Card for The Jungle Book. Mowgli (Bruce Reitherman) is born and found in a basket as a baby in the deep jungles of Madhya Pradesh, India by Bagheera (Sebastian Cabot), the black panther. He promptly takes him to an Indian Wolf who has just had cubs. She raises him along with her own cubs and Mowgli soon becomes well acquainted with jungle life. Ten years later, Mowgli visits the wolves and gets his face licked eagerly when he arrives. One night, when the wolf pack learns that Shere Khan (George Sanders), a man-eating Bengal tiger, has returned to the jungle, they realize that Mowgli must be taken to the "man village" to protect him and those around him. Bagheera volunteers to escort him back. They leave that very night, but Mowgli is determined to stay in the jungle. They spend the night on a large tree, where they encounter Kaa (Sterling Holloway), a python who hypnotizes Mowgli and wraps him in his coils in order to eat him. Bagheera stops him, and he and Mowgli go to sleep. The next morning, Mowgli tries to join the Indian elephant patrol led by Colonel Hathi (J. Pat O'Malley). Bagheera finds Mowgli and they argue; Mowgli runs away from Bagheera. The boy soon meets up with the fun-loving bear Baloo (Phil Harris), who shows Mowgli the fun of having a care-free life and promises not to take him to the man village. Mowgli now wants to stay in the jungle more than ever. Before long, Mowgli is caught by a gang of monkeys and taken to their leader, King Louie (Louis Prima) the orangutan, who makes a deal with Mowgli that if he tells him the secret of making fire like a human, then he will make it so he can stay in the jungle ("I Wan'na Be Like You"). However, since he was not raised by humans, Mowgli doesn't know how to make fire. Bagheera and Baloo arrive at the palace, unseen and try to plan a way to rescue Mowgli, but the catchy beat of the song distracts Baloo and he wanders off dancing. Soon, however, he appears dressed in banana skins and coconut shells posing as a female orangutan which fools the King. But soon, Baloo's disguise is revealed and there begins a mad chase between the monkeys and Baloo and Bagheera over Mowgli. The King accidentally knocks down a pillar and holds up the temple the best he can until he struggles when Baloo begins to tickle him frantically under the arms. The monkeys manage to stop Baloo's tickling but end up bouncing the king onto the other pillar instead, causing the temple to collapse in a rumble. Mowgli is rescued from King Louie by Bagheera and Baloo. Bagheera explains to Baloo that the jungle isn't safe when Shere Khan is around. As morning arrives, Baloo explains to Mowgli that the Man Village is best for him, but Mowgli accuses him of breaking his promise and runs away in the deepest part of the jungle. Bagheera (after Baloo explains to him) then finds the Elephant Patrol and tells Hathi of Mowgli running away with Shere Khan himself overhearing. Hathi then organizes a special search mission for all his herd. Later, Kaa hypnotizes Mowgli into a deep and peaceful sleep and traps him in his coils again (after tricking him that Mowgli can trust him). Thanks to the intervention of Shere Khan, Mowgli escapes before Kaa can eat him. He encounters a group of solemn vultures (J. Pat O'Malley, Digby Wolfe, Lord Tim Hudson, and Chad Stuart), who closely resemble The Beatles, and they say they'll be his friend. The vultures argue and continually sidetrack Mowgli with their pointless arguments. Shere Khan appears shortly after and challenges Mowgli to a fight, but Baloo rushes to the rescue. Baloo is knocked unconscious and Mowgli ties a flaming branch onto Shere Khan's tail in order to get rid of the ruthless tiger. Baloo then wakes up and he and Bagheera take Mowgli to the edge of a man-village, but Mowgli is still hesitant to go in. His mind soon changes when a young girl from the village comes down by the riverside to fetch water. After noticing the boy, she "accidentally" drops her water pot, and Mowgli retrieves it for her and follows her into the man village. After Mowgli chooses to stay in the man village, Baloo and Bagheera decide to head home to the jungle. CastEdit Jungle-Book-characters Promotional image featuring the characters, with the French title on the upper-right corner. Bruce Reitherman provided the voice of Mowgli, who is the main protagonist of the film. Mowgli is an orphaned boy, commonly referred to as "man-cub" by the other characters. Phil Harris voiced Baloo, a sloth bear who leads a carefree life and believes in letting the good things in life come by themselves. Sebastian Cabot voiced Bagheera, a serious black panther (melanistic leopard) who is determined to take Mowgli back to the village and disapproves of Baloo's carefree approach to life. Louis Prima voiced King Louie. King Louie is an ape who wants to be a human and offers to let Mowgli stay in the jungle (by bribing him with bananas) if Mowgli shows him the secret of "Man's Red Flower" (fire), though why he wants it is unknown. George Sanders voiced Shere Khan the Bengal tiger and the film's main antagonist, who wants to catch and eat Mowgli. For this reason, the Wolf Council votes to send Mowgli away. Bill Lee provided his singing voice. Sterling Holloway voiced Kaa, an Indian rock python and the film's secondary antagonist, who, like Shere Khan, is determined to catch and eat Mowgli. J. Pat O'Malley voiced Colonel Hathi the Indian elephant and Buzzie the Vulture Verna Felton voiced Winifred, Colonel Hathi's wife. It was Felton's last film role, with her dying one day before the death of Walt Disney, during the film's production. Clint Howard voiced Junior, Colonel Hathi's son. Chad Stuart voiced Flaps the Vulture Lord Tim Hudson voiced Dizzy the Vulture John Abbott as Akela the Indian Wolf. Ben Wright as Rama the Father Wolf. Darleen Carr as The Girl (named Shanti in The Jungle Book 2). UncreditedEdit Digby Wolfe as Ziggy the Vulture Hal Smith voiced the Slob Elephant Ralph Wright voiced the Gloomy Elephant Leo De Lyon as Flunkey the Monkey Bill Skiles and Pete Henderson as Monkeys Thurl Ravenscroft as Colonel Hathi's crew ProductionEdit Development and WritingEdit After finishing The Sword in the Stone, writer Bill Peet suggested Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book as the next film to Walt Disney. Disney agreed and bought the rights to the book. Peet decided to follow the dramatic, dark, and sinister tone of Kipling's book and wrote an early treatment with little to no supervision, as he had done in One Hundred and One Dalmatians and The Sword in the Stone, along with character designs as well as the idea for the song "The Bare Necessities". The original story tells about the struggles between animals and man. Since the novel is very episodic, with Mowgli going back and forth from the jungle to the Man-Village, Peet made the story much more straightforward; felt that Mowgli returning to the Man-Village should be the ending for the film. Following suggestions, Peet also created two original characters: The human girl for which Mowgli falls in love, as the animators considered that falling in love would be the best excuse for Mowgli to leave the jungle; and Louie, king of the monkeys. Louie was a less comical character, enslaving Mowgli trying to get the boy to teach him to make fire. The orangutan would also show a plot point borrowed from The Second Jungle Book, gold and jewels under his ruins - after Mowgli got to the man village, a poacher would drag the boy back to the ruins in search of the treasure. However, disappointed by the reception of The Sword in the Stone, Disney was determined to be more involved within the story than he had been in the past two films that were written by Peet, with his nephew Roy E. Disney saying that "he certainly influenced everything about it. (...) With Jungle Book, he obviously got hooked on the jungle and the characters that lived there." Disney soon became critical of Peet's original treatment and how the story turned out, as he felt it was too dark for family viewing and insisted on script changes. Peet refused, and after a long argument, Peet left the Disney studio in January 1964. Category:Movies Category:Animated Films Category:Animation Movies Category:Animation Studios by Little Airplane Productions